Why I’m Marching (and Organizing) for Science

My brother with a butterfly we raised when we were real tiny and real excited for monarchs.

What am I marching for? I’m marching for a childhood that knew the scent of milkweed and the feeling of caterpillars crawling on my hands. I’m marching for the silent moment when a chrysalis turns from green to black-and-orange. I’m marching for a world where you can hear the flutter of a butterfly’s wings as it tests its wings against the air.

I’m marching so I can keep finding these guys on hikes

What am I marching for? I’m marching for clear, babbling streams, teeming with clams that retreat into the sand under curious, clumsy feet. I’m marching for my mother, my brother and I finding animal skulls and owl pellets in the woods. I’m marching for the family that found themselves together in our grandparents’ back yard, whistling to birds and watching fox kits peek out from under barns.

I’m marching because my sister is brave but she can’t walk for more than a few minutes.

What am I marching for? I’m marching for my sister. I’m marching for a girl born with a rare mutation, a one-in-a-million baby riddled with benign tumors. I’m marching because walking causes her pain. I’m marching because my sister lives in pain, with tumors pinching, pulling, straining her nerves. I’m marching because she was dealt a bad genetic hand, one that robs her hearing, cuts her mobility, drains her stamina. I march for kids like my sister–disabled, disadvantaged, invisible–because there aren’t enough of them to make their disease profitable. I march because any one of us could have been such a child, any of us could have such a child.

I’m marching because despite all appearances this lake is unsafe to swim in or drink.

What am I marching for? I’m marching for friends I never made. I’m marching because the last time the political class decided to ignore science and health funding a generation of gay men was devastated. I march for the tens of millions who died worldwide. I’m marching because I was told I couldn’t be gay at a university that was funded, in part, by grants written in blood, written with the deaths of queer folk like me. I’m marching because our deaths haven’t yet bought us a place at the scientific table. I’m marching because many of those people live on–neglected, isolated and ignored. I’m marching because people arestilldying. I’m marching because I can’t wait for the current president’s Gay Best Friend to die in a climate change-attributed “extreme weather event” or of a new plague. I march because I can’t wait for people who are comfortable and happy to notice our pain. I march because I don’t want us to wait until it’s too late.

I know not everybody is able to march. I know not everybody wants to. I know that the March for Science has (rightly)lost the trust of many in the #marginsci community. I march in the hope that you’ll do things other than march, that we together will fill the voice mails of our politicians, that we’ll flood their inboxes digital and physical, that we’ll make town halls loud and angry. I march hoping to see you at other marches, to work with you in other places. I march because as imperfect as the march is I’ve met good, caring, badass people at my local march and I can’t let them down.

If you have a reason to march I hope to see you there. If I don’t, here’s hoping that I see you at the next one.

The March for Science is on April 22nd in 400+ cities worldwide. You can find your local march here. A version of this piece was published on Medium.

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Vince Gabrielle

Vince is a recent graduate trying to get a goddamn job that pays the bills. He's working on a super secret project FOR SCIENCE! He is not (in order) awake, a bricklayer, fierce, or Ongwe Ias: Eater of Men. Ask him about science, fish, role-playing games, kink, fiction writing, or graduate school.